2021-22 Premiere League Thread

[jeffbear]

Just like with former Villa legend John Terry, I've always loved Stevie G and have never said a negative thing about him in the past and you can't prove otherwise. Also, the reason England's midfield never worked was always because of Frank Lampard eating all the pies and not at all because of Stevie. The replay isn't available on peacock for another hour for some reason, but looking forward to watching the match. Villa were just desperate for new leadership. Dean Smith did well bringing Villa out of the championship, but the entire last season was really held together by Jack Grealish making everything happen.

Same ... or similar at least. I always had a bit of a soft spot for Stevie. It was mostly an awesome debut just because of the result, but I'll take it. If nothing else, he had a basic formational gameplan and stuck to it ... which was NOT what Smith had been doing. I'l always like Dean and he's a real Villa man to the core, but that thing of devising a completely different approach to every game was rubbish.

 

[Ed H in Pasadena]

Sunday's results

• Manchester City 3 Everton 0
• Tottenham Hotspur 2 Leeds United 1

City's win leapfrogs them into second, while Spurs get their first win under Conte. And not sure what's happened but right now, Leeds are fighting a losing battle when it comes to staying in the Prem. A shadow of last year's side.

 

[Ed H in Pasadena]

Tables after Matchweek #12

Premier League 2021/22

#	Team	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts
1	Chelsea	9	2	1	30	4	26	29
2	Manchester City	8	2	2	25	6	19	26
3	Liverpool	7	4	1	35	11	24	25
4	West Ham United	7	2	3	23	14	9	23
5	Arsenal	6	2	4	13	17	-4	20
6	Wolverhampton Wanderers	6	1	5	12	12	0	19
7	Tottenham Hotspur	6	1	5	11	17	-6	19
8	Manchester United	5	2	5	20	21	-1	17
9	Brighton and Hove Albion	4	5	3	12	14	-2	17
10	Crystal Palace	3	7	2	18	17	1	16
11	Everton	4	3	5	16	19	-3	15
12	Leicester City	4	3	5	16	21	-5	15
13	Southampton	3	5	4	11	14	-3	14
14	Brentford	3	4	5	16	17	-1	13
15	Aston Villa	4	1	7	16	20	-4	13
16	Watford	4	1	7	16	20	-4	13
17	Leeds United	2	5	5	12	20	-8	11
18	Burnley	1	6	5	14	20	-6	9
19	Norwich City	2	2	8	7	27	-20	8
20	Newcastle United	0	6	6	15	27	-12	6

 

[VinatieriDefinesClutch]

Same ... or similar at least. I always had a bit of a soft spot for Stevie. It was mostly an awesome debut just because of the result, but I'll take it. If nothing else, he had a basic formational gameplan and stuck to it ... which was NOT what Smith had been doing. I'l always like Dean and he's a real Villa man to the core, but that thing of devising a completely different approach to every game was rubbish.

I liked what I saw. McGinn was seemingly putting in dangerous balls every time he touched it and I liked the press and attack mentality that should only get more cohesive over time. I'm not saying that the ref screwed over Villa by any means (well, other than the attack that he allowed Brighton to continue for a long time while they had a player down injured in the box and then immediately stopped play when Villa won the ball and looked to break, that was ridiculous), but the way the game was refereed greatly favored Brighton. Brighton wanted to play a possession based game and Villa was looking to press and attack quickly and every time Villa took possession, Brighton was immediately fouling and the ref took almost the entire match before finally handing out a yellow and then did the thing where he makes sure the cards are equal so even though Brighton committed twice as many fouls in the game, both teams had three yellows. At some point, you have to say even though it's early in the game, it's going to be a yellow card if you're fouling to stop a counter attack each time otherwise you aren't allowing a team to play their gameplan.

 

[jeffbear]

I think McGinn should benefit a great deal from the system Gerrard played at Rangers ... presuming that's where we're heading once things settle down. He generally played a double pivot with the midfield 3, with one guy rooted to more defensive duties while the pivots were free to combine with the wingers and the forward man a bit. McGinn is really good at that kind of triangle action when he's turned loose a bit. Not so sure who fits the other two roles, but Johnny should be solid. He's got a lot more to offer than what Smith was asking from him. Weirdly, I also think his system should fit Sanson well ... presuming he's not so alienated that he's already checked out. If not, Ramsey it is. He'll figure out how to track back at some point, one assumes.

 

[Ed H in Pasadena]

Watched part of the Villa match before I headed to the pub (60'). McGinn was super impressive. Cash and Mings looked good, too. Too bad Emi Buendia was off his game. Hopefully he'll get things sorted quickly. Really rated him highly coming into this season

 

[jeffbear]

Buendia has been either hurt or terrible (or both) since the first international break. Not sure if that was down to Smith having no idea what to do with him or him just not being settled yet. I figure 3-4 games in a regular role being asked to do things he normally does would do the trick.

 

[Ed H in Pasadena]

Buendia has been either hurt or terrible (or both) since the first international break. Not sure if that was down to Smith having no idea what to do with him or him just not being settled yet. I figure 3-4 games in a regular role being asked to do things he normally does would do the trick.

I sure hope so. Was a huge fan of his from the last Norwich promotion. Had hoped we'd sign him for squad depth for the last few seasons. Was happy he signed for a big side like Villa (yeah, I said it).

 

[andyt]

Man U has hired Ralf Rangnick as interim manager. He’ll have a 6 month contract and 2 year consultancy. He’s currently the head of sports and development at Lokomotiv Moscow but Man U doesn’t anticipate a problem getting him released. He‘ll miss the weekend’s match against Chelsea waiting for a work permit.

 

[jeffbear]

Man U has hired Ralf Rangnick as interim manager. He’ll have a 6 month contract and 2 year consultancy. He’s currently the head of sports and development at Lokomotiv Moscow but Man U doesn’t anticipate a problem getting him released. He‘ll miss the weekend’s match against Chelsea waiting for a work permit.

Interesting. German manager who kind of kicked off the trend towards pressurized football in Germany, with the end result being Red Bull's high pressing, multi-club system. He got kicked upstairs a long time ago though, so he must have gotten a serious itch to get his hands dirty on the touch line again. Honestly, he's a guy that could signal a big sea change in how Man United go about their business .... or he could purely be a caretaker to keep them from coming off the rails even further and nothing more. If they are serious about making a directional change this could be the first of several changes ... or not. Who ever knows with this crowd?

 

[andyt]

Interesting. German manager who kind of kicked off the trend towards pressurized football in Germany, with the end result being Red Bull's high pressing, multi-club system. He got kicked upstairs a long time ago though, so he must have gotten a serious itch to get his hands dirty on the touch line again. Honestly, he's a guy that could signal a big sea change in how Man United go about their business .... or he could purely be a caretaker to keep them from coming off the rails even further and nothing more. If they are serious about making a directional change this could be the first of several changes ... or not. Who ever knows with this crowd?

The Athletic has had a ton of coverage on him since the announcement. Apparantly he thought he was in the mix to replace Mourinho after he was sacked but they went with Solskjaer, who had an out in his contract with Molde if Man U called.

Rangnick has only coached 2 full and 2 partial seasons since leaving Hoffenheim in 2011. He finished the 2010-11 season with Schalke but left in September citing exhaustion. Since then, he had 2 spells with Leipzig, both times more or less as an interim even though they were full seasons.

 

[jeffbear]

FWIW ... Gerrard followed up that first win at Villa with another. They leaked a goal to Palace late but took home the 2-1 win, and once again played a cohesive shape for the entire game. I knew I would probably like this change and thus far, it's working out.

 

[VinatieriDefinesClutch]

Felt great, Villa looked dangerous and well structured. Very glad for VAR allowing the ref to rethink his atrocious red he gave out. Really excited to see what Villa can do as they all get more comfortable, but allowing for the small sample size, I'm very happy with the direction the team is heading in under Stevie G.